The Sadfleck has become such a huge part of our collective cultural consciousness that it has its own nickname. In fact, it’s such a big deal, I wrote an entire sentence about it without even mentioning the name Ben Affleck and I still bet you knew exactly the moment I was talking about. The actor himself has encountered the meme in the wild and has commented on the viral video before in a way that was both hilarious and rueful. So, it’s certainly a defining moment for the Batman V Superman star, but I find it hard to believe it happened an entire decade ago.
You know the “Sad Affleck” meme. Back when Ben Affleck was doing press for Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice alongside fellow star Henry Cavill, the two were asked about the reception to the Zack Snyder film. Cavill started giving a candid answer, but Affleck just sat there looking, well, sad. Then some enterprising YouTuber out Simon Garfunkel’s “Sound of Silence” on in the background of the video. A viral moment was born.
Now, 10 years later, that YouTuber was asked about the Sadfleck meme by Tom Butler, the Yahoo interviewer who’d originally asked about Batman V Superman’s critical reception. I’d never really thought deeply about how he’d come up with it, thinking it was a creative choice, but the viral video creator, Kyle Miller, admitted it wasn’t even something he came up with. After the interview was posted, it was actually a fan reply that got Miller thinking.
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Somebody then replied to it, saying, ‘Hello, darkness my old friend.’ I just got the idea from there. That’s all it took. And I made the video in five minutes.
The process was a little more sophisticated than just slapping the song onto interview footage, though not much. Miller also took the opportunity to zoom in on Affleck’s face as Cavill started talking about “the interesting thing” about all the mixed reviews.
Miller says he was never paid or earned money for the viral video, but he did feel its considerable cultural impact. “Sound of Silence” briefly charted again, and the YouTuber was listening to the radio when the moment was brought up:
I knew it was really big because by the end of that day the radio was on in my room, and they were talking about it, and they were playing like the music and Ben Affleck’s response, and I thought, ‘Well, that’s quite crazy.’
It was the music combination with the close-up that really made the video so memorable. Well, that and the fact that this seems to be Ben Affleck’s resting face during high-profile moments. Just check out this time he and then-wife Jennifer Lopez attended the Grammys together. Of course, more “Sad Affleck” comments rolled around. He’s a great actor, director and writer, but there’s been plenty of speculation he doesn’t love the press and promotional part of Hollywood.
It officially happened a few months ago, but I’m still shook up Zack Snyder’s movie dropped 10 years ago now. I probably shouldn’t be, as so much time has passed I’d honestly kind of forgotten Dawn of Justice was even a part of that movie title. We’ve moved on to James Gunn’s take on DC and Matt Reeves’ take on Batman, but the legacy of the Sad Affleck meme will likely live on as long as Ben Affleck does.